


Common Cause

by roughmagic



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Aftercare, Dom/sub Undertones, Established Relationship, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, Gambling, Happy Ending, Light Bondage, M/M, Multi, Oral Sex, Other, Polyamory, Reader-Insert, Rimming, Subdrop, Subspace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-26
Updated: 2016-06-26
Packaged: 2018-07-18 08:22:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7307470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roughmagic/pseuds/roughmagic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If he wanted to maintain some kind of professionalism, maybe he should’ve talked to you about your presently malfunctioning threeway relationship somewhere other than the kitchen during your lunch break. </p><p>Soldier 76/Reader/Reaper</p>
            </blockquote>





	Common Cause

**Author's Note:**

> There was such a lovely positive response to Double Duty that I decided to go ahead and continue it, and really wrap it up and give it a nice conclusion. It turned out a lot longer than I intended, but I had a ton of fun with it! I guess either fic could be read on their own, but this is honestly a direct continuation.

You’re on your lunch break, catching up on the news when Soldier 76 marches up to the kitchen table and says, “I wish you’d cover those up.”

It takes you a moment to realize he means the marks on your neck, all of them fading and none of them very fresh. There’s a lot, and it’s nothing your teammates haven’t seen before. You keep scrolling through the news and take a sip of your drink. “If wishes were horses, Jack.”

He sits down across from you. “You’re not happy.”

He seems so genuinely concerned, even anxious, that you falter. It’s the crease in the brow above his visor and the set of his shoulders that give it away, more than anything. You’re reminded that 76 is newer to this kind of emotional honesty than you are, despite being older. Despite Gabriel. Neither of them would ever, ever talk to you about it, but you gossiped with Angela and you filled in enough gaps to know that things had been so complicated between the two men, being honest with you was even harder for him to navigate. 

You set down your tablet, aware that he’s making an effort and that you should too. “I’m not _un_ happy.”

“If he did something— if _I_ did something—” He pauses, but you let him dangle long enough that he’s forced to finish the thought. “You swore up and down when this started that you’d end it if it got to be too much.”

“It’s not that.”

“But it’s something.”

It’s frustrating to be trapped across the table from him, trying to have this conversation with a mask and visor in the way. “I feel like you aren’t giving him a chance.”

“You have something you want with him. I won’t ruin that.” There’s a slight turn of his head that gives away where he’s looking. “For either of you.”

That he’d admit he cares at all, even a bit, about what Gabriel has or wants is enough to get you to stand and close the distance between the two of you. You swing a leg over his and straddle his lap, running your hands up the plane of his chest. 

He doesn’t have to say _We’re in public_ for you to know he disapproves, but you’re beyond caring. Everyone already thinks he’s leaving massive hickeys all over you. If he wanted to maintain some kind of professionalism, maybe he should’ve talked to you about your presently malfunctioning threeway relationship somewhere other than the kitchen during your lunch break. 

You unclasp his visor, turning it over in your hands and wait for him to make eye contact with you. “You also made me swear up and down that I’d be honest, if I remember right.”

“I did.”

“Then, in all honesty, I think you’re underestimating him.”

Instant brow furrowing. “I’ve never—”

“You won’t tell me anything about what he was like when you were together, so I can’t speak for your experiences. But Gabriel is someone I trust and love, as weird as it sounds to say that out loud.” You want to say _He stayed, Jack, he stayed when I asked him to,_ but that would open up an entirely different can of painful emotions.

He sighs, gaze flicking up to meet yours. “Sounds like you’ve got an ultimatum for me.”

“Just try. For me— _with_ me. The three of us, in the same room, and if it doesn’t work out, I’ll never ask again.” You’re not really sure what to try and picture apart from the three of you in the same space— watching a movie? Trying to eat dinner? Skipping straight to sex?

“It means that much to you.”

It would be overdramatic to say _Dividing myself between the two of you is going to eventually leave all of us with nothing,_ so, you keep it to yourself. “The happiness of you two does, yes. So, tonight. My quarters.”

“This could end badly.”

“I’ll keep a cattle prod handy.”

76 grunts his assent, and you smile. “Get off my lap before people start to talk.”

“Way too late for that, Jack.”

He smacks your butt as you leave, and you laugh with a light heart.

 

You find Gabriel brooding in the practice range, stinking of ozone. “Come to my room tonight, okay?”

“Maybe.”

“Jack’s going to be there, and I want you to be there at the same time.”

“We’ll see.”

He says it so calmly and self-assuredly that you think about tearing his mask off and kissing him to court his anger, but it seems more likely to drive him away out of spite. 

You settle for halfway, and kiss his mask on the cheek before he shoves you off. You pass by a bewildered Junkrat on your way out. 

 

Jack arrives first, still in full gear and holding a bottle of whiskey. It’s very bizarre, but it’s also an attempt, and you just stare at him for a moment with fondness. 

“Too much?” he asks, staring at the whiskey.

“I’ll pretend it’s mine.” You pat him on the shoulder and take the heavy bottle from him, setting it down in the kitchen. By the time you’ve come back, Gabriel is standing in the doorway like the world’s largest and most dangerous trick-or-treater, still refusing to cross the threshold. Jack is staring at him like they’ll have to draw arms and fight to the death at any moment. Maybe you should’ve left the whiskey out here. 

“Gabriel,” you start, pleasantly. “Thanks for showing up. Can I invite you in?”

“Haven’t decided if I’m staying,” he seethes, claws of both gauntlets flexing in challenge. Jack’s hands curl into fists, and you think maybe you shouldn’t have just been joking about keeping a cattle prod nearby.

Like a smoky angel, Jesse McCree of all people stretches up to look over Gabriel’s shoulder, tilting the brim of his hat out of his eyes. “Well, this is an odd sight. What’re you folks up to this evening?”

You freeze up and in the silence Jack says, “Poker.” 

Jesse’s eyebrows lift a little, like he’s not sure he believes him. “Open table?”

“Why not?” Gabriel asks, slow and smug with his mask firmly fixed on Jack. “Sweetens the pot.”

Fuck Jesse McCree, and fuck Gabriel Reyes. Fuck Jack Morrison while you’re at it— but this is starting to sound like a list, and you are not trying to turn this into an orgy. 

“Sure,” you hear yourself say, almost dazedly. “Let me get the cards.”

The bizarre novelty of playing poker with 76, Reaper, and McCree at the same tiny table in your living room wears off quickly when the hierarchy is established. McCree’s the best player, Jack and Gabriel are about tied, and you’re losing. Badly. 

The good news is that the whiskey is at least being drank. Mostly by Jesse and you, but Gabriel and Jack have their own untouched glasses, as if waiting for the other to take off his mask first. You’re not getting drunk fast enough, but you know if you get sloppy then the whole evening will spiral out of control. 

Jesse, at least, is having a good time, having just out-bluffed all of you with a three of a kind. 

You shove the last of your cash towards the pleasantly beaming cowboy. “Well, I’m broke.”

He whistles. “I’m sure not.” 

“Because you’re cheating,” Gabriel hisses, tossing his cards to the table in disgust.

“You’d have to catch me to prove it.” Jesse flutters his eyelashes at him. “Now, if I’m correct, we’ve got two players who are plum broke. You got anything else to bet?”

Jack’s visor doesn’t move an inch, and he’s not that far away from being broke himself, so he’s not going to save you. If the card game ends, you think, so does the night. In all likelihood. Gabriel or Jack will take McCree leaving as an excuse to leave too. You take a sip of your drink and regret it.

Jesse shuffles the cards, overly casually. “How about the mask, Gabe?”

Gabriel’s hood jerks towards McCree and you know Jack is watching just as intensely as you are. The quiet around the table is heavy, and McCree continues shuffling the cards and maintains a lazy expression. 

“Get fucked, _Jesse,_ ” Gabriel snarls, and you take a quick drink to hide your smile.

“Feeling shy, Reyes?” Jack asks, and you know things are only going to devolve further, so you make a show of struggling out of your shirt, successfully derailing the approaching argument. 

“You’re all wasting time,” you announce, combing at your hair with your fingers before throwing your shirt into the middle of the table as a bet.

Jesse’s cigar slowly moves to the other side of his mouth, and he scratches his jaw. “Most folks start with socks and jewelry, y’know.”

Gabriel puts in his mask next, and you try not to stare. Seeing him in a fully lit room is a novelty and a pleasure, and you don’t miss the way his eyes flick over the garden of marks on your neck and chest. 

In the next four hands he’s sitting on at least a complete outfit, and starting on a second cigar. “Well. I’m fleecing you poor souls, metaphorically and literally. Sure you don’t want to stop?”

“I want my gloves back,” Jack mutters, promptly losing his visor and mask in one hand to Jesse’s queen as the high card.

In the next hand you lose your pants to a pair of goddamn deuces and swear the whole time you’re getting out of them. You hear Jack grunt _Eyes on the cards, cowboy,_ and remind yourself that Jesse’s already seen your blood, guts, and tears on the battlefield. Thighs aren’t anything to be ashamed of. 

You glance at Gabriel and find him staring at you and looking dully angry, sort of displeased in a full way. He’s never shown much possessiveness, but you suppose being in a room with Jack and another man might be putting a strain on him. Jesse gets a smile from you as you toss your pants over, and he just squints a little. 

Somewhere past the point when you lose your pants, there’s more of a tension. Jack and Gabriel seem to acknowledge each other more, and you watch while only partially trying to conceal your interest. Jack loses his boots. Gabriel loses his gauntlets. Jesse makes a joke about being able to do a ‘cos-play’ and you almost threaten to fight him over a royal flush that he clearly has no business having.

It’s fun, until it isn’t. 

Jack has to stop himself from drumming his fingers on the table when you’re down to everything but your underwear. Jesse had stopped making eye contact with you entirely and seemed to be slowly turning red. Gabriel had been staring at hole in the table for the last two hands anyway, and you feel as though you’ve maybe started to embarrass them all. 

To his credit, when he turns up another flush, Jesse gives you a gently apologetic look. “You’re runnin’ a bit low on funds, darlin’, how about you just owe me one?”

“You won the hand.” Gabriel interjects, taking a long drink of whiskey and leaning back in his chair. “Collect the bet.”

“Forget it, Gabriel,” Jack snaps, before immediately glowering at you. 

You stand up, annoyed that everyone’s suddenly got an opinion on your business. “I lost the bet, I’m not going to go back on my word.”

“You aren’t giving him your underwear.”

“Who’s gonna stop me?” Your hands at least manage to touch the fabric before Jack grabs your wrist. 

From your other side, Gabriel closes his hand around yours and drags the waistband on his side over your hip, eyes locked with Jack.

“I’m startin’ to get the feeling I’m interrupting something,” Jesse says, just a touch nervously, like it’s a joke. 

“Get out, McCree,” Jack snarls.

“Much obliged for the game." He stands immediately, collecting the cash he’d won before blowing out the door like an embarrassed cloud of cigar smoke. 

You look over to Gabriel, sweetly. “Taught him everything he knows, huh?”

“I let him win.”

This only serves to make Jack angrier, and he stands up, chair shoved back from the table. “Were you trying to humiliate us?”

Gabriel stands as well, even with his greatcoat hung on the back of McCree’s chair there’s still a rush to it, a vague sense of being enveloped as he stands behind you. “You liked it.” Even though he’s the one sliding your underwear off, mouth hot and close to your shoulder, you know Gabriel’s talking to Jack, and it puts a shiver through you. “Getting righteously riled up.”

The door opens again and Jack puts himself between you and McCree, who looks genuinely sheepish. 

“Forgot my hat.”

 _“McCree!”_ Jack barks, and Gabriel slips a string of gorgeous Spanish curses into your ear as the cowboy flees a second time, hat in hand. 

You laugh as the door slams shut behind him, fondly. At least he got all your pocket money for his troubles. Gabriel’s hands run down your arms, warm and huge when they both cinch around your wrists, pulling you back against him. He pushes forward into you and you can feel him starting to harden against your backside, even as clothed as he is. 

It pulls your posture open and leaves you quite suddenly at Jack’s mercy, as he turns back from locking the door and glares at you, all the pent up irritation of the card game landing squarely on you. It takes a lot of will not to grin. “What’s that look for?” You struggle briefly to see what Gabriel does, but he won’t let you move too much. Besides the illicit thrill of restraint, it stokes the sparks in your stomach to know that he’s participating, that he’s accommodating Jack. 

“You know damn well.” Jack doesn’t look at you as he downs the last of his drink. “Putting yourself on display like that.”

Gabriel transfers your wrists to just one of his hands, letting the free one snake around to your front, tracing up your neck to hold you by your jaw, forcing you to look upwards and meet Jack’s gaze. “Makes you an inconsiderate host.”

“Aw,” you huff, only slightly because of the pressure of Gabriel’s forearm against your throat. “You two didn’t have fun?”

You’re ready for it, you want the two of them in a common cause, to punish you for letting McCree get an eyeful. The thought that you’re willing to let them push you harder and farther than you might’ve originally bargained for crosses your mind and it’s frightening for a split second. Like a flash of lightning it illuminated the landscape of your situation: you were involved. All the promises you had made to Jack and to yourself weren’t as strong as you thought. You wanted them both too much to stop before your heart broke. 

“Maybe I’ll ditch you both for McCree,” you blurt, before you can stop yourself. “He looks like he knows how to show someone a good time—"

The rest of your taunt is lost as Gabriel’s hand moves to seal against your mouth, and you suddenly sound more frantic as you’re forced to breathe through your nose alone. Jack’s eyes are cold fire and you don’t ever think you’ve seen him more fired up. He doesn’t want to hurt you, he never does, but it doesn’t stop you from feeling a flutter of fear in your stomach that surpasses the giddiness. 

“You’re in for it now,” Gabriel remarks, softly. 

Jack kneels, but you’re not allowed to look down at him, forced to stare at the wall and the ceiling and revel in the fact that he kneeled first, not really before you but before Gabriel, he was willing to put that kind of trust in the other man, you know it means something and you know it’s good, you know a lot before your whole body starts in surprise and scares you out of thinking. Jack slides a hand up under the edge of your underwear and drags it down, leaving you bare and vividly aware of it. He curls his fingers into the soft spots at the backs of your knees, pulling you open until his mouth finds you, hot and wet enough to make your hips jerk at the feeling. 

Gabriel murmurs, “He was always good with his mouth,” and you can only whimper against his palm. He makes a long, vaguely pleased noise and contents himself with sucking another mark onto your neck. 

He’s still good with his mouth, apparently, because it’s all you can do not to grind down against his face. It’s obvious enough that Jack reaches up to try and steady you, tongue working against you in warm, liquid laps and you moan against Gabriel’s hand for lack of a better outlet. It’s all you have as Jack builds you up and lets you coast back down again and again, using every time he’s put his mouth to you to work you up again now, faster and easier. 

You know him as well as he knows you, though, and you don’t let yourself silently beg for him to finish you off. He won’t, not after you pushed him so far and so rudely. He still leaves you wracked with tremors and aching for him when he stands up, Gabriel’s hand retreating from your mouth. 

Your chest heaves, breathing greedily again and taking pleasure in that gives Gabriel a moment to leave you alone on two unsteady feet. He returns and puts a hand against your neck to guide you, before bending you over and against the card table, and you hear the jingle of a belt that was lost in the card game. 

Jack arranges your arms how he wants them, bent at the elbow and crossed behind your back. The belt loops around them to hold them together and in place, and you catch him testing the tension to make sure it’s not too much before buckling them in. 

“You did your homework, Jack,” you sigh, still a bit punch drunk. “Bet you wanted to tie me up for a while.”

“I’m a patient man,” he sighs, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand as he takes a seat in one of the discarded table chairs, waving a hand wearily. “All yours, Gabriel.”

“Unlike you, I know how to share,” the other man sneers, putting a big hand between your shoulder blades and pushing until you get the idea, Jack meeting you halfway and catching your shoulder, lowering your face to his lap. 

It has the effect of bending you over, presenting your ass to Gabriel, but preventing you from watching him. Jack cards his fingers through your hair until he finds a vantage point he likes and anchors himself there, a firm and tight fist near your scalp. 

You should be trying to undo his pants with your teeth right about now, but all you can focus on is Gabriel’s hands running up and down the backs of your thighs, squeezing and working over the all but faded bruises left there from Jack. _I move when you move, sweetheart,_ he says, mocking the endearment and making your face burn faster. You make some energetic but fruitless attempts at getting Jack’s zipper open with your teeth and he takes pity on you, undoing the fly of his trousers. 

His cock is waiting for you under the cotton of his briefs and some part of you is still trying to come up with a _Not going Strike Commando today?_ joke but it’s not worth the effort, not when you can smell the clean salt of his sweat and kiss the damp line of precum that had worked its way down the fabric.

Jack rumbles pleasantly above you and hooks the waistband up so you can grab it with your teeth, shoulders and neck burning at the strange angle as you drag the offending clothing away and lay him out bare to the open air and the hot rush of your breath. He jerks a little as you lick a long, wet stripe up his length and Gabriel pinches your ass as either encouragement or admonishment for taking too long. 

You can’t stop your eyes closing in satisfaction as you gently work his head into your mouth and then all but down your throat, fighting the initial gag and listening to Jack make a pained noise as he feels it, tonguing what you can and already drooling a mess. 

Gabriel’s breath is warm on your ass, and then the cleft of your ass, and then by the time you feel his lips there you’re already making a noise of shock that rubs Jack the right way, judging by how he starts underneath you. The thought that he’s feeling what Gabriel’s doing, somehow, through you, keeps you humming eagerly as Gabriel tongues you, hot and wet and plying in a place you wouldn’t have expected to feel as good as it does. 

Jack tries to help you a little by supporting your shoulders as much as he can, but he can’t resist resting a hand on your neck as you push forward to take him deeper, swearing softly as he feels your throat around him. All you can taste is his salt and pressure, heat building between your legs as Gabriel continues. You can feel it all happening in concert to you, feel your own body singing with it, but there’s a deep kind of distance to everything else. There’s nothing but the three of you, all you care about is chasing the two of them. 

Gabriel starts to work your ass farther open with spit-slicked fingers and you let him. Jack says something like _wait_ and Gabriel pulls away to say _yeah?_ and Jack pushes you off of him and you gasp at the sudden loss and resulting rush of sweet tasting air, and he says _I’ll make that easier for you._

Long bridges of spit and precum ribbon out between your mouth and his cock and the absence of it leaves your jaw feeling slack as he gets up, moving outside of the narrow area of focus that you have left. Your knees, locked for such a long time, are screaming, and Gabriel says something to you quietly that lets you unlock them, legs folding immediately. The floor bites at your knees and you hope for the biggest, blackest bruises. 

Maybe later you’ll feel ashamed of acting like this, but you can’t care. Behind you, Gabriel stands up and runs his hand over the spot where Jack had kept his hand fisted in your hair and you lean into it, following the touch back to him and nuzzling obviously at his cock. 

You don’t have the coordination to try and get his underwear off with your teeth, which works in your favor when he undoes his pants and he doesn’t have any on. Your jaw is too tired for much, but you can lick at him until he takes the initiative, prying your lips open with steady fingers and letting you take him into your mouth. He’s just as big as Jack, but gravity isn’t working against you. It’s leisurely. You can use your tongue more, tasting him and feeling your guts warm at the thought that he tastes different than Jack, that you’ve had them both like this, that they’re both here. Gabriel watches you with his regular intensity, eyes dark but not hard. 

Jack’s hands dig into your sides and your legs protest as you have to stand, although he supports most of your weight. He asks how your arms feel, and you remember that they hurt almost as much as your legs, but there’s only numbness prickling at your fingertips, so you say that you’re good, voice hoarse. He warns you that you’d better not be lying, pressing his mouth to your temple, and you’ve got a fluttery laugh for him in response. 

You sway a bit as he turns you around, and you find yourself with your back pressed against Gabriel, like how this had all started. 

Jack keeps you steady, leaning to press a kiss on the mark Gabriel had left on your neck. Gabriel murmurs approval as the familiar fragrance of the lube you keep in your bedside table makes it through to you, right before his fingers return to your ass, hot and slippery. He’s so slow and teasing that it barely feels like an invasion, and he makes you ask for the second and third fingers. You’re about to ask for a fourth when he pulls away and the two of them work on lifting you, spreading you and you work on remembering to breathe in between pleads for them to please, please, _please._

Jack bears your weight as Gabriel works himself in, soft rocks of his hips punctuating the feeling of your body pulling him in deeper, until there’s not anywhere left for him to go. You arch back against him and his mouth goes to your ear and a dark language pours in, filling you up with hot black coffee and the smell of ozone and the taste of his skin. You only realize you’re chanting his name until you start to beg for Jack, the other man’s fingers stroking you where you’re still wet and open.

Greedily, you want take them both, you know it can do it and you want it. You know they know it, but you beg for it anyway. Jack’s hands are high on your thighs and you do your best to hang onto him too, and when he finally seats his head against you, you can’t breathe until you feel him push in, push you open and stretch you and it’s more than you’d imagined and more than you could hope to describe. 

You can feel both of them inside you, and you know they can as well, and you hang onto that thought until one of them moves enough to set you off and you’re coming, and then of course they start to move, Gabriel in short, shallow bounces because _you’re so tight, cariño, look at you,_ Jack moving with desperation against you, his forehead against your collarbone as his hand reaches up past you to Gabriel, to curl around the curve of his skull. 

Where one of you ends and the other starts is lost to you, nothing apparent except Jack’s breathing against your chest, Gabriel’s voice on your neck and how tightly pressed you are between them, skin pushing and scraping against you with a fevered, inescapable friction. Jack comes first, with a gasp and a flurry of thrusts that push even louder cries out of you until he stops, holding fast and still until Gabriel follows suit with a groan, hands sinking into your hips. The slide back down from where you had been is slow, but you come one more time, sharply and almost painfully as they withdraw with a lewd patter of cum and lube. 

Feeling the both of them breathing against you, your own heart hammering in the middle, is worth the pain in your shoulders and your jaw and your legs and your heart, it’s worth all of it and you force yourself to remember it, as much as you can hold onto anything like this.

Jack sets you down on the table, chest and face flushed, and you shiver at how cold and unforgiving the surface is underneath you. You watch them both reach for the belt’s buckle around your arms and stop, locking eyes. Jack’s hand moves away first and Gabriel undoes the belt and you bite on your lip and let your toes curl to keep a wail from escaping because it _hurts_ , the return of feeling painting out quickly and harshly how long your arms had been pulled back, but you don’t want to ruin the moment. You can tell, even dizzy and winded and shaking, that this is important for them. 

Gabriel leans against the table, still breathing hard and Jack moves around your legs hanging off the edge to be close to him— arranged so closely and so deliberately as to be as close as he could, but not able to bridge the last gap. 

Gabriel puts his fingers to the sweaty gray spikes of Jack’s hair and combs through them, fingers eventually cradling the back of his head in a mirror of Jack’s motions from before. He drags him in and puts a tired kiss against the scar on Jack’s forehead, cursing him roughly and elaborately. Jack says, “Yeah,” and shuts his eyes, and you feel the bottom of your stomach drop out in joy and fear. 

Watching them any more feels like looking at something private and not meant for you, and you ignore the pain in all your extremities to hobble to the bathroom. Your fingers twist the sink knob for hot water clumsily, and you flex your hands to try and encourage feeling back into them. It’s mostly static, but hopefully not nerve damage. Probably not. If it is, Angela will have an interesting morning hearing you explain how it happened. 

You look at yourself in the mirror under the unforgiving lights, still sweaty and flushed in a few places. Angry marks all over your body, still shaking with effort. There’s a kind of pride. You did it. Whatever exactly it was you had set out to do, you had done it, probably to even greater success than you would’ve guessed. 

Wetting a washcloth with the hot water, you fight a sharp intake of breath as you clean yourself off. It’s mostly lube. If you don’t shower you’ll feel gross in the morning, but you just want to sleep. You soak another it again and wring it out, shocked at how quickly you had returned to reality. The dream was over. 

Walking hurts, but you want to get away from the bathroom mirror, so you return to the living room and listen to the slow, deep back and forth of the two men talking. Not quickly or easily, but still talking. You think about trying to clean up the empty drink glasses and shuffling the cards back into a deck. 

“Sweetheart,” Jack says, shocked and terribly broken and you look to him, startled. 

“What?” You sound afraid, and terribly childish in your own ears. Gabriel’s looking at you with the same concern and that’s enough to terrify you. “What’s wrong?”

Jack approaches but his hands go to your elbows, holding you gingerly. “You’re crying.”

“Bullshit,” you say, thickly, but you are. Embarrassingly big tears roll down your cheeks and you’re scared by how uncontrollable it feels, how quickly it snuck up on you. It’s not just the fear of them leaving, but some other kind of huge gulf that’s opened up and it won’t stop.

“I’m sorry,” Jack chokes out, hoarse. His arms wrap around you and you cling to him despite yourself. 

“You didn’t hurt me,” you sob, ashamed and confused. “It was just a lot, I’m fine, I’m fine—” You reach a hand out past Jack towards Gabriel and he takes it immediately, big fingers lacing up with yours and squeezing, but not enough to hurt. That strange gentility pours another wail out of you, and they drag you to bed. 

The two of them take turns cleaning up, but there’s always one with you. Jack gets dressed in a hurry and you know that watching him leave even temporarily will set you off again, so Gabriel sits next to you on the bed and lets you clasp his hand to your chest while you hide among the pillows. Being at the mercy of this strange, awful weakness pushes hot tears of shame out of you. 

“I didn’t mean to ruin things,” you say, muffled by pillows. 

“Shut up,” Gabriel whispers. He gives you a long, slow prayer in Spanish and only stiffens a little when you wedge your face against his chest. 

Jack shows up again, with a full medkit that you refuse, but a biotic emitter that you let him activate. You watch Gabriel watch him activate it, carefully but patiently. It’s definitely the warm yellow glow that slows your heart and stops all your painful aches, giving you room to feel the full brunt of exhaustion.

Gabriel shifts beside you, withdrawing his hand but keeping himself pressed against you. “Don’t just stand there.”

There’s a telling silence before Jack sits down on the edge of the bed, and you listen with all the energy you have left. He takes his boots off and the mattress shifts as his weight lines up against yours on the bed. He puts a testing hand on the small of your back, before curling the arm over and around you.

The biotic field’s calming aura finally begins to work as relief courses through you, stronger than the overwhelming and unfounded fear. You’ll all be sticky, rumpled messes in the morning and more serious healing might be needed in a few spots, you know. And Jack and Gabriel will go back to snapping at each others’ heels and being suspicious, you know, but it will still be better. They’ll be better. They have proof things aren’t broken between them, not all the way and not irreparably. 

And they have you.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! Although this particular story arc is over, I look forward to many more Overwatch shenanigans. :')


End file.
